Street Roots • Sept. 21-27, 2018
HUD, from page 5
are written in such a way that they are
kind of blarney,” said Julia Delgado,
program director at Urban League of
Portland. The way it’s designed, she said,
“a lot of people would be reluctant to
answer honestly and accurately because
there is a lot of shame and stigma
associated with a lot of the questions.”
Her organization primarily uses the
assessment with African-American
Portlanders. She said it presents a host of
challenges for people of color, given their
deep mistrust of the system following
horrific events in recent history, such as
the Tuskegee experiments and forced
sterilization.
Quinn Colling, an outreach coordinator
at JOIN, said he’s also heard from
co-workers and other community partners
who conduct the assessment that it may
not accurately assess the vulnerability of
communities of color.
While locally, a couple of questions have
been added to try to address this
discrepancy, such as asking if a person has
ever experienced racial discrimination in
housing, “there’s still gaps,” he said.
Portland is one of five U.S. communities
that’s partnered with the Center for Social
Innovation in Massachusetts to study
whether the tool reinforces racial
inequities in housing and homelessness,
despite being designed in “an ostensibly
race-blind manner,” said Caty Wilky, deputy
director of research and evaluation at the
center.
-HUDawardsabout $25 million annually'1
to Portland and Multnomah County that
helps pay for, among other programs, 900
units of permanent supportive housing
reserved for chronically homeless people
who also have a disability.
Locally, 2,051 adults without children in
their households have been run through
the vulnerability assessm ent Due to the
low level of federal investment in
permanent supportive housing for
chronically homeless people, just 189 have
been referred to housing, and of those, 121
have been housed.
Portland and Multnomah County
lawmakers have announced a goal of
establishing 2,000 new units of supportive
housing by 2028. An undetermined
number of those units would be permanent
supportive housing.
Today, about two-thirds of Multnomah
County’s existing 3,582 units of permanent
supportive housing is federally funded. The
goal is to tip the scales moving forward. Of
the 2,000 new units, about two-thirds are
expected to be locally funded, meaning the
assistance would come with more flexibility
and freedom from federal requirements.
This would also mean additional units
would be available to chronically homeless
people with disabilities, and most units
would not require third-party verification,
should they materialize.
There are 517 units of both permanent
and temporary supportive housing units
that are either new or in development in
Multnomah County since the 2,000-unit
goal was set, and just 20 will incorporate
HUD funding, triggering the agency’s
requirements.
HUD’s shifting policies
In the wake of deep and ongoing budget
N ew s
cuts starting in the late 1970s, HUD has
instituted stricter requirements to ensure
its remaining housing resources go to the
people who need it the most.
In 2009, HUD consolidated its grants for
homeless services and revamped the way it
wanted housing organizations to award its
vouchers for permanent supportive
housing. In 2012, it implemented those
changes.
Whereas before, each social-service
agency that helped get people into
supportive housing had its own list of
applicants it would funnel into its own
HUD-funded programs, HUD now wanted
providers to work together, put every
applicant on the same list, and pull from
that list whenever any member
organization has an opening.
“You can get a voucher through any
organization, not just the one you have a
relationship with, and that, to me, is one of
the major benefits of Coordinated Access,”
Borke said. Under the new model, she
said, providers are reaching some
extremely vulnerable people who they
might not otherwise have brought into the
system.
In December 2015, however, HUD
added new requirements that included
running all homeless people who were
being considered for federal housing
vouchers through a uniform assessment
before placing them on the list, and then
providing proof of chronic homelessness
should their names come up for housing.
According to Norm Suchar, who runs
the homelessassistance program at HUD,
this was because the assistance was going
to the wrong people.
“In the past, what we saw in a lot of our
programs was that permanent supportive
housing projects were serving people who
- to put it very bluntly - were easier to
serve, who hadn’t been homeless that long,
whose disability was not that severe,”
Suchar said. “Not to say that those
individuals don’t also deserve help, but we
knew we needed to use permanent
supportive housing for those people who
really had the highest level of vulnerability,
who’d been homeless the longest, who had
the most severe disabilities.”
He said that while he is aware of
complaints about the new requirements,
they are working, with assistance now
going to the right people.
“I don’t want to claim it’s super easy,”
said Suchar. “We are trying to look at this
to see if there are better ways to do this.”
When asked if the assessment process
would be enough to pinpoint the most
vulnerable on its own, without third-party
documentation, Suchar said that’s true for
some communities, but it’s not true for
others.
Home Forward’s Slingerland said HUD
made the changes because it wasn’t seeing
the drop in chronic homelessness it
expected to see after initiating the
program.
Suchar said, “That is certainly one of
the reasons.” He also said, however, that
although assistance is being better
prioritized, the. country is continuing to
see a rise in chronic homelessness.
Slingerland said the reason HUD isn’t
seeing a drop in chronic homelessness is
not because housing assistance is being
misappropriated; it’s because there isn’t
enough housing assistance to go around.
Page 7
“These documentation requirements are
trying to solve a problem and creating
others that get in the way of housing the
folks that HUD is actually trying to house,”
said Michael Buonocore, executive director
at Home Forward.
“And there’s an
unintended cruelty
BY THE NUMBERS
to it, in asking for
Supportive housing in Multnomah
the kinds of efforts
that are needed to
County:
verify someone’s .
traumatic experience
Permanent supportive
of being chronically
housing units
homeless.”
3,582
Still looking
118 Transitional housing units
2,000
On Aug. 1, Jones
New units of supportive
took George to meet
housing planned by 2028
with a housing case
manager from
Units of supportive housing
Northwest Pilot
that are new or in development
Project in the
cafeteria inside the
Standard Building
Who’s served by supportive
downtown. They’ve
found an apartment
in an affordable
3 w w w Individuals without children
senior housing
complex that he
could apply for. It
□O f Families with children
■
would cost him a
percentage of his
experiencing
Social Security
chronic homelessness
benefits and was
located in the
Source; CSH report for dty and county officiaIs
Hollywood District, |
close to the Max and
near the Dollar Tree store where he likes
to shop. It seemed perfect.
“That’s quite a bit of money though,”
George told the case manager.
He said if he paid rent, he’d have no
money left for food. They tried to explain
to him that he qualifies for food stamps
and Social Security benefits and that he
can afford to move inside. He just didn’t
seem to understand how it could work.
They told him they
could get him a bed
and other furniture
G E H IN G SOMEONE
and help him make
ASSESSED
the place a home.
If you see someone who is chronically
“All I need is a rug
homeless and mentally or physically
to sleep on,” he said.
disabled, you can contact the CHAT
After about a half-
H
hour, George tells the
send someone out to give the person
two women he’ll think
an assessment. Include in your
about it.
message a description of the person,
When Street Roots
the location where they hang out and, if
caught up with
you can obtain it, their name and a way
George again about a
month later, he was
to contact them.
" H
' 1
sitting on a bench in
Email caa@trprojects.org, or leave a
the park in front of
message at 844-765-9384
the courthouse. We
asked if he had
decided to take the
apartment.
“No, too expensive,” he said. “I think
I’m going to stay outside again this winter.”
Jones said it’s a matter of finding
something that’s he’s comfortable with.
She intends to keep trying.
517
2,995
1,1
emily@streetroots.org; tw itter @greenwriteS